James Altucher QnA
When I was a kid I used to buy MAD magazine once in a while. At the back of each issue was a section called, “Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions”. Funny, but rude.
These days I do an almost daily Success QnA on my ETR Fanpage devoted to giving snappy answers to smart business & success questions.
Best-selling author James Altucher takes it one step further and does his QnA on Twitter delivering “Shorter snappy answers to social media questions”. His audience asks all sorts of things, and I’ve curated some of the best from a recent session for you.
Over to you James, choose yourself. – Craig
Q: Have any ideas for turning a love of coffee into a way to create wealth & freedom?
James Altucher:
Make a book: 100 Ways Coffee Will Make You Wealthier, Healthier, and Beautiful”. Then make a blog and videos, etc., about the ideas in the book.
Q: Reading as much as you do, how do you absorb it properly? Do you take notes or something like that?
JA:
I don’t know if I absorb anything I read. I just keep reading because it’s fun and I hopefully I take in a little
Q: Will our economy pick back up? Can we be a superpower again?
JA:
What other superpower is there that controls all the water in the world and all the innovation in the world? Another way to look at it is: let’s say we weren’t a superpower. Who cares?
Q: How much should I promote my Kindle free days? I want to make $ from book, but also market my expertise and drive traffic to blog
JA:
I don’t think you should use the Kindle free days. I think those days don’t help so much. People value what they pay for.
Q: Are your tales of comeback overly dramatized because you had access to decision makers? Most unknowns knock Doors w/no response
JA:
I never had access to decision makers until I started getting healthy and generating tons and TONS of ideas
Q: Blog content: how many days a week?
JA:
Write every day. but you don’t have to post every day. only post when you feel something is TIGHT.
Q: Is there a difference between “positive thinking”, “fantasizing”, and “daydreaming”?
JA:
Replace positive thinking with just gratitude and “WOW!” There’s no way to really know what you “need”. Stop asking for what you don’t need, so you leave room to get the things you need.
More important than positive thinking is being around people who love you. What’s more important than positive thinking is sleeping 8 hours or more. What’s more important than positive thinking is having lots of ideas and being grateful.
Q: How do you deal with the stress and depression that comes with starting a business?
JA:
A business is only one part of you. There are friends, family, your inner health, etc. Every day focus on the balance and less stress.
Q: How many hours a day do you write?
JA:
I read for 3 or 4 hours a day and probably write for 4 or 5 hours a day. Most things I write are very bad and I hide.
Q: How do I over come the emotional fear and social conditioning to venture something I never thought of.
JA:
The way you do that is through healthy sleep, eating, being around good people, and being grateful every day all day.
Q: If you are starting out, how would you approach well known brands to partner with you?
JA:
You always have to show the well known brands how they can make money with you. that is all they care about. Never forget that nobody cares about you. You have to over-deliver for them and then over-deliver more.
Q: How did you get so good at raising funds for deals?
JA:
When you add EXTRA value to people (value they did not expect) it compounds in your life. You build trust. They follow you into deals.
Q: What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever written?
JA:
Everything I publish is scary to me. I don’t publish something unless it scares me. How else will it stand out?
Q: In your blog you mention prioritizing ~7 hours sleep. How did you manage that in the start-up world?
JA:
Find out all those moments that you waste during the day on junk: news, gossip, waste, etc., and eliminate them. They add up. A CEO should sleep at least 8 hours a day.
Q: How do you restore a broken trust? Is it even a good choice to start with?
JA:
You can’t restore a broken trust. a cut in the skin needs to heal only with rest and gentle care. Don’t force it or you infect it.
Q: Starting out, is it a bad idea to write for someone else’s blog routinely more than your own?
JA:
Your NAME is the destination. not your BLOG. Starting out, ONLY write for someone else’s blog. That’s how you build an audience. Later you can start your own blog.
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Very interesting replies, particularly the comments on writing.
Back Monday with more from CB,
Craig Ballantyne
“Surround yourself with people better than you.” – Warren Buffett